Media sequences of various kinds are available to users from various sources via the World Wide Web (“the web”). As examples, a user may access an audio sequence containing a song, a lecture, or a radio program; a video sequence containing a sports contest or silent-movie scene; or an audio/video sequence containing a movie, music video, television program, or news report.
Because the cost can be high for providing the storage and bandwidth resources needed to make media sequences available via the web, some media sequence providers sell advertising to be included in media sequences accessed via the web to defray these costs. In one common conventional approach, providers of media sequences select for each primary media sequence they make available an advertising message whose subject is similar to the subject of the primary media sequence, and whose media type is the same as the primary media sequence. For example, to a primary media sequence that is an audio/video news report about a hurricane in the Bahamas, the media sequence provider may attach an audio/video advertisement for a weather information service.
While this conventional approach may result in at least modest advertising revenue, it has the disadvantage that it causes the same advertising message to be shown to every user accessing the primary media sequence. Where the users accessing a particular primary media sequence have divergent interests, such “blanket” advertising may be less productive.
Accordingly, an approach that permitted advertising messages attached to media sequences to be more specifically targeted to the users accessing the video sequences would have significant utility.